Milling

The You Ji VTL-1200ATC+C is a 49" table/63" swing vertical turning lathe with full C-axis and live milling for heavy-duty turning and milling of large workpieces from Absolute Machine Tools Inc. This heavy-duty, highly productive VTL weighs in at 72,600 lbs. and features a rigid vertical column and a Meehanite castings base, which is heavily ribbed for reduced thermal distortion and vibration damping.

When it comes to achieving high material-removal rates in even the toughest materials, it's hard to beat helical cutters. With the correct insert grades and cutting data, these cutters can achieve far greater depths of cut than non-helical milling tools without sacrificing reach or the ability to hold tolerance. This means higher rates of metal removal at speeds that reduce the time the inserts spend in-cut, simultaneously minimizing cycle times and maximizing tool life.

Tungaloy expands its SolidMeister, a family of solid endmills, to include FeedMeister solid-ceramic endmills. Solid endmill applications are expanding as components are becoming more complex and miniaturized using diverse, difficult-to-cut materials such as heat-resistant superalloys.

To better serve customers in Asia, Kern Microtechnik GmbH, Eschenlohe, Germany, set up a sales and service location in Shanghai called Kern Asia Pacific.

Are you maximizing your Profile Milling efficiency? Constant profile ramping is a much more effective approach than conventional Z-level profiling. Watch side-by-side as a Dapra 1" end mill (50 IPM / .100" DOC) using constant ramp profile outpaces a traditional 1° helix entry and Z-level rough by more than 50%.

Double your feed rates with the Stabilizer 2.0 from Niagara Cutter. This family of end mills raises the bar in high performance milling by incorporating a patented continuously varying asymmetrical geometry which helps create a smooth, chatter free milling condition.

Hypertherm is launching Robotmaster V7, a task-based robot programming platform built from scratch on a new architecture. Robotmaster V7 caters to process experts to make robot programming easy and intuitive, even for first-time robot users. This new programming platform builds on the performance of Robotmaster's offline programming CAD/CAM software that was first introduced in 2002.

I received an email from a reader letting me know that he disagreed with my recent article on tapping versus thread milling. In it, I stated, "There's little chance of successfully thread milling metals much above 45 HRC. And if you're going to try to tap them, be prepared to duck the flying shrapnel when the tap explodes!" We all make mistakes. So when Tom Fares, president of TNT Custom Equipment in Stow, Ohio, called me out on that section of the article, saying that he routinely taps holes in 45 HRC steel alloy and thread mills into "the low 60s," I listened to what he had to say.

Two alternative portable pipe milling tools for performing welding end preps on pipe and tube from 0.5" I.D. to 3" O.D. with different bores and wall thicknesses are available from Esco Tool.

The new release of Edgecam, from Vero Software, contains 54 items of new or enhanced functionality that improve productivity for manufacturers by using a range of cutting technologies and machining strategies. They include significant changes to the Pre-Drill Approach Roughing cycle, creating features from wireframe entities, 3D milling cycles in mill-turn Rotary mode, 28 new technology databases in the Wire EDM module and Tombstone.

By packaging both turning and milling functions in a single machining center, machine tool builders believe they've hit on a winning combination that can boost part quality while also slashing cycle times, space and costs.

If you've ever struggled with inserts coming loose during a slotting operation, keep reading. How about inconsistent slot widths, fumbling with awkward screws and inserts on a slotting cutter, or having to use a piece of shim stock to pry wedged chips from deep inside a slotted workpiece? These are just a few of the problems machinists face when trying to cut narrow slots and grooves, but thanks to the newly introduced Kennametal Narrow Slotting (KNS) cutter, the days of "slotting dread" are over, according to the company.